"Speech at the European Social Forum, Paris, November 2003"

Toni Negri

[On Thursday 20 November 2003 the Global Radio-Padova website published the
text of Toni Negri's speech at the European Social Forum in Paris. The
original Italian text can be found on their website at
Global. Translated by Ed Emery.]

"I am Italian, so I shall speak in Italian -- particularly because I too
would like to begin by remembering with sympathy and with much emotion the
Italians who have died in Iraq in recent days. Italians have not been used
to having war-dead, not since fascism sent many of our friends and relations
into the monstrous adventures of the Second World War. The last thing we
needed was for a democratic regime to overturn the very terms of the Italian
constitution by sending poor wretches to die in a war which the vast
majority of Italians do not understand the reasons for, and which they
oppose.

"The Spaces of a Cultural Question"

Brian Holmes interviewed by Marion von Osten

[In preparation of
"Atelier Europa: A Small Post-Fordistic Drama," opening April 2,
2004 in the Munich Kunstverein.]

Marion: You are editing the next issue of Multitudes on cultural and
creative labor. Can you explain why and out of what perspective you look
on cultural labor and creative work, i.e. do you think it is possible to
explain the inner dynamics of post-Fordist production modes due to this
specific form of work and its conditions?

"Is Truth Enough?

The Bush Administration's Lies and the Anti-War Movement's Truths"

George Caffentzis

[A transcription of a talk given to the "Truth and Consequences" Anti-War Forum at the
University of Maine, Augusta, Maine, on March 20, 2004.]

1. Polls and Truth

I was preparing an up-date on the developments in the oil industry in Iraq since the US invasion last year when I noticed on the front page of the March 17, 2004 Portland Press Herald a graph showing the results of a poll taken in eight countries concerning the motives of the Bush Administration in launching the war on terrorism (which it elides with its invasion and occupation of Iraq).

It was very disconcerting and has forced me to think again about politics and truth. Along with a little summary up-date of the situation of Iraqi oil industry one year into the occupation then, I want to look more carefully at the consequences of the truth for our political work.

"Bush: I'm God's Delivery Boy"

Matthew Rothschild, The Progressive

Bush's messianic militarism was on full display on March
11, when he addressed, via satellite, the National
Association of Evangelicals Convention in Colorado
Springs.

First, acting as pastor in chief, he said, "You're doing
God's work with conviction and kindness, and, on behalf
of our country, I thank you."

Separation of church and state, anyone?